Washington, 3 July 1997 (RFE/RL) - U.S. State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns says Secretary of State Madeleine Albright will visit Vilnius later this month for meetings with Lithuanian leaders.

Burns said yesterday that Albright will visit the Lithuanian capital following the Madrid NATO summit and stops in Warsaw, Bucharest, Liubljana and St. Petersburg. He said she will also visit her native Prague.

Burns said the U.S. hopes Albright's stop in Vilnius will be expanded to include officials of the two other Baltic states -- Estonia and Latvia -- in a broader meeting.

After visits to Warsaw and Bucharest with President Bill Clinton, Burns said Albright will go separately to Ljubljana for a Saturday, July 12, afternoon meeting with Slovenian leaders to brief them on the NATO summit.

Burns said that evening Albright will fly to St. Petersburg to continue discussions with Russian Foreign Minister Yevgeni Primakov on START II and other issues they began while both attended the turnover to China of Hong Kong.

On Sunday evening, July 13 Albright is scheduled to visit Prague and, according to Burns, spend most of Monday, July 14, in meetings and other events there. Burns said Albright is expected to leave Prague for Washington Monday afternoon.